In today's online environment, users may choose from a multitude of Internet search engines, e.g., Google, Yahoo, Bing, etc., to submit search requests and for a variety of information needs, which may include, for example, conducting online research, engaging in product or service searches, or otherwise exploring content on the world wide web and/or searching the Internet in general. Typically, when users submit such information (e.g., search requests) to Internet search engines, the respective search engine providers (e.g., Google) may store such information. However, the users are generally not incentivized, or otherwise compensated, for the information they submit. This may create a problem, or at least a lost opportunity to users, because in today's modern, information-based economy, such search requests or other information, is increasingly valuable. For example, such information may be used in a variety of “Big Data” applications. Currently, however, the value of such user information is neither clearly known nor is it monetized to the benefit of search-engine users.
Search engine providers can maintain a search history of users past searches. This search history may be made available to advertisers who may desire to pay the search engine provider for opportunities to deliver advertisements to users based on past searches. Oftentimes, advertisers do not, however, get direct feedback as to whether or not users subsequently purchase advertised products. For example, users may click a link in an advertisement to view additional product details, but the user may not end up actually purchasing the product. In any event, the advertiser would not receive a verification of an actual purchase.
Other similar problems exist for current search engines, in that, today, current search engine providers must deal with at least two competing, and potentially conflicting, motivations. Namely, those of search engine users on the one hand, and those of search engine advertisers on the other hand. Particularly, search engine providers need to provide useful information in response to the user's search request. At the same time, however, search engine providers must also meet the needs of advertisers, who often desire to influence the information returned to the user via paying the search engine provider to inject specific advertisements. For some search engines, the paid advertisements heavily influence not only the information displayed to the user, but also the priority in which such advisements is displayed. For example, a search request submitted by a user for a local plumber may result in a response with advertisements, or other responsive information, displayed at the top of a list, prioritizing those plumbers (or other advertisers) who paid the most to the search engine provider. Such responsive list may compete with, or otherwise be in conflict with, the user's ultimate objective, which may be to identifying a highly qualified plumber at a best, or reasonable, price point. Thus, the conflicting or competing motivations of each of the search engine users and search engine advertisers creates a problem that detracts from both search engine users and search engine advertisers in that, on the one hand, search engine users experience less useful search results, and, on the other hand, search engine advertisers may experience a mismatch of their specific advertisements to desired users, and, therefore waste advertising expenditures on payments to search engine providers to target the wrong users, or at least users who won't end up actually purchasing the products as advertised.
Thus, systems and methods are needed to optimize search engine results, as disclosed herein, to address these and other problems experienced by search engine users and search engine advertisers when utilizing or otherwise engaging conventional search engines, search engine providers, etc.